


You Know What I Mean

by trash4ficsaboutlurv



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, Thor (Movies)
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Angst with a Happy Ending, F/M, Light Angst, Redemption, Spoilers, thor ragnarok - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-12
Updated: 2017-11-18
Packaged: 2019-02-01 05:18:03
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 10,780
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12698139
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/trash4ficsaboutlurv/pseuds/trash4ficsaboutlurv
Summary: Valkyrie would love nothing more than to fly through the velvety blackness of space in the big, strong arms of Thor Odinson. There's just one problem: people with her sins don't get happily ever afters





	1. Chapter 1

Valkyrie passed her thumb over the smooth skin where her tattoo lay, an absent-minded tick she had picked up since Thor first noticed the glyph. Over the course of her centuries in Sakaar, Valkyrie had learned not to see it. It had become as uninteresting as a birthmark, a freckle, the arbitrary graffiti from a civilization that had fallen away into relics and ruin.

And then Thor and Loki had forced her to remember, to feel that loss again, a loss so pointed and cruel it had torn jagged lines through her drunkenness, had left her raw and upset.

Until she got another drink inside of her. Something that scorched her throat and numbed the pain.

There were just some agonies no one was meant to bare sober, not even a Valkyrie.

Watching Asgard explode in dramatic fashion hadn’t done her mentality any favors, either. It was funny: Valkyrie had thought she’d severed all loyalty and sentimentality to her homeland after Odin sent her, her kin, and her lover to die at Hela’s hands, and it had only been the irrevocable destruction of Asgard that had alerted her to that last tenuous thread of connection. She supposed it wasn’t all that funny at all. Noteworthy. That’s what it was.

A knock at the door of her small cramped room – she had leveraged her position as a Revenger to get her own tiny closet sans roommate – was a welcome distraction. Thor stood in the doorway looking awkward and dopey and cute – Valkyrie hated to admit it, but he was very cute.

“Yes, Your Majesty?” She sat up on her narrow cot and reached for a bottle of liquor. The spaceship had a pretty generous supply, thank the gods.

“Hulk isn’t the greatest conversationalist,” Thor said. He smiled.

“Is he ever going to be that scrawny guy again? I kind of liked him.”

“Remains to be seen,” Thor said. “When we get to Midgard, there will probably be a lot of reminders of Banner. Maybe enough to bring him back out.”

“You don’t sound very sure,” Valkyrie said. She took a swig from her bottle.

“I am not.”

“Tough breaks all around then. You lost your eye, the little man is lost inside the big one, et cetera, et cetera.”

“Well, we didn’t die,” Thor pointed out.

Valkyrie didn’t say that there were worst things than dying. Thor already knew that. “What’s on Midgard?” she asked. “Are you returning to the arms of some grateful Earth woman?”

Thor grinned, as if to say, _I see through you, Valkyrie._ “I’ve saved Midgard a few times,” he said. He waited for Valkyrie to be impressed and she couldn’t help but give him his recognition with a smile and an only-slightly-sarcastic patting of her hands together. “Which means they’re all pretty grateful. But no particular woman is waiting for me.”

“And Loki?” Valkyrie asked, pivoting away. She liked to keep Thor off balance.

“Loki is a problem I don’t want to think about right now.”

Valkyrie narrowed her eyes at her king. Wasn’t it he who said they should run towards their problems and not away from them? As far as she could tell, Thor had been running after that little shit Loki their whole life. Maybe he deserved a break. And who was she to tell him that figuring out what to do with his brother needed to be a priority _before_ they reached Midgard, the site of all his crimes? Or point out that the Midgardians might not want _any_ Asgardians on their planet in light of Loki’s mischief, which was the sole reason Thor had needed to save their world in the first place.

Thor had just watched his planet explode, same as Valkyrie. He’d also killed his sister. Lost his eye. That hammer he wouldn’t shut up about. Maybe he deserved to not think about Loki for a bit.

She patted the thin cushion of her mattress and held up a second bottle of liquor.

“Drinking is good for not thinking,” she offered.

***

Thor was even cuter when he was drunk. His skin flushed and his eyes – sorry, eye – looked even bluer. His easy smile widened, and he used his hands to punctuate his words more. When he knocked Valkyrie’s blade off its shelf and onto the ground with one of his expansive gestures, Valkyrie cocked her head.

“You’re probably going to have to train more,” she said. “To adjust for the depth perception issues.”

Thor chuckled. “I am a god and a king. I do not need to train more.”

Valkyrie smirked. “Hulk is the strongest being I’ve ever met and he still trains.”

“Hulk is _not_ stronger than me,” Thor said. He tried to scowl but his good nature could only manage a child-like pout. “Without your little gadget, I would have won that fight.”

A niggle of guilt tweaked Valkyrie’s smirk and she chugged down another few gulps of alcohol. They had moved on from the smooth brown whiskey to clear liquor and the stuff tasted like it was some sort of stripping agent for troll warts or spaceship engines. Even a well-seasoned drunk like Valkyrie made a face as the liquid hit her tongue. “Sorry I enslaved you for Grandmaster,” she muttered. She stared at the tile floor and chewed on her bottom lip.

“That’s actually pretty far down on the list of terrible things my friends and family have done to me,” Thor said. “Remember, both of my siblings have tried to kill me. A lot.” He huffed out a laugh and shook his head. His smile made the corners of his eyes crinkle and his laugh lines more pronounced. His chuckle rolled into a full out laugh that seemed to envelope Valkyrie too, and she laughed with him. Maybe she was officially too drunk. Or maybe everything was just hilariously difficult in life and sometimes laughing with someone else was a pretty good coping mechanism.

“You need better friends, Your Majesty,” she said.

“I had pretty good ones on Asgard. My sister killed them.” Thor laughed again, a breathy sad laugh. “Best friends you could ask for.”

“Hela was good at killing people you care about,” Valkyrie said. She passed the bottle to Thor and watched the way his lips kissed the rim, the subtle shift of tendons in his throat as he swallowed.

She wondered if Loki had told Thor the details of Valkyrie’s last battle with her sisters. If Loki had _felt_ her grief and rage, her love for Sigga as that blade pierced her chest. Or if it had all been like a play to him, at a distance, on a stage.

“They are in the great halls of Valhalla,” Thor said. “Father. Fandral, Hogun, Volstagg. The Valkyries. We will see them again. I know it.”

 He passed back the bottle and Valkyrie rubbed her tattoo.

“Did you have any friends on Sakaar,” Thor asked after a long silence in which they shared the bottle between them, taking short, contemplative sips instead of the long, numbing ones from before.

“Yeah,” Valkyrie said. “Topaz. She and I were peas in a pod.”

Thor laughed. “I’ll take that as a no.”

Valkyrie shook her head. “You don’t make friends on Sakaar. Not when you’re a stumbling, angry drunk. Not when you sell people to Grandmaster.” She chewed her bottom lip some more. “Are you sure Loki and I should be going to Midgard actually? We’ve both royally screwed up. A genocidal maniac and whatever I am -- we don’t make the group look good.”

Thor put a hand on Valkyrie’s shoulder. “Loki may be a lost cause, but you…” He paused and studied her as if weighing his words. The look in his eye was the same as it had been when they’d finished taking down all the fighter ships on Sakaar and stumbled into one another on board the orgy ship. Banner had interrupted before their looks could develop properly into anything, but Banner wasn’t here now. Valkyrie held Thor’s gaze and the atmosphere thickened, charged with static.

“Your Majesty?” Valkyrie said.

Thor rubbed her shoulder. “I think you can find some redemption,” he said.

Redemption. Valkyrie liked the sound of that.

“Sorry,” Thor said suddenly. He pulled his hand away. “Didn’t mean to get familiar.” A spark of playfulness danced across his face.

His hand had been warm where it touched Valkyrie, and its absence was surprisingly noticeable. Excluding the many brawls and fights Valkyrie had been a part of, who had touched her in the many long decades since her fall. Who would Valkyrie have _let_ touch her. She hadn’t entertained the notion of another person since Hela killed Sigga. It hadn’t been prudent or smart. Now, there wasn’t anything in the way of her closing the distance between her lips and Thor’s. Except that he was a good person down to the marrow of his bones. And she was – at best – morally questionable.

She had sold people to Grandmaster and hadn’t cared if they lived or died in that arena. And most of them had died. The guilt tasted like the worst hangover she’d ever experienced.

Valkyrie handed Thor the bottle for the last finger’s width of drink. She watched him, feeling a dull misery at what might have been -- if she hadn’t spent centuries being the worst version of herself, if Thor weren’t a king and a god and saint. “You’ve had all my liquor, Your Majesty,” she drawled, overemphasizing her alcoholic slur. “At least, what I’d rationed out for the day. I suggest you go try to make conversation with the Hulk now. You’ve killed enough brain cells for it.”

Thor raised his eyebrows, clearly surprised, maybe even a little hurt. Valkyrie ignored that. She had to ignore that.

“I’m gonna pass out now and I’d like to do it alone,” she added.

“Right,” Thor said. He stood up wobblingly and reached out to steady himself on the wall. When he found his balance, he looked at Valkyrie as one might a longtime friend who has disappointed you. “Don’t get familiar, right?”

Valkyrie nodded. “That’s right,” she murmured. “Don’t…” She sighed and stopped fighting the darkness at the edge of her vision; that clear alcohol had been more potent than she realized. She didn’t even feel her head hit the pillow.

***

“We’re not playing for anything, so what are the odds that I would cheat?” Loki demanded, his arms crossed over his chest in prime pouting form.

“You are a trickster, Loki. It is in your nature. And the game is only fun when it’s fair.” Thor studied his cards intently and Loki rolled his eyes.

“That is utter drivel. And I’m bored.”

“Find a way to entertain yourself, then,” Thor said impatiently. “That doesn’t involve speaking to or hurting anyone on board this ship.”

“It is not in my self-interest to cause problems right now,” Loki said. “If you don’t trust me, trust my self-preservation instinct.”

“Loki, I do not trust you or any of your feelings. Now, will you please be quiet. I cannot think!”

“Um, New Doug?”

Thor looked over the rim of his cards at Corg. “What?” he snapped.

“Do you, um, have a nine?”

Thor’s irritation disappeared in a cocky grin. “Go Fish.”

Valkyrie, who had been watching them play card games for several hours, tried to set her empty bottle on the table and missed, but before it could crash to the ground, both she and Loki caught it.

“I’ll have some of what you’re having,” Loki said. He smiled his oily, sly smile and Valkyrie let go of the bottle.

“I don’t share,” she said.

“You can’t tell me you’re being mentally stimulated by this room of halfwits,” he said.

Valkyrie held up a new bottle, full of ruby red drink that tasted like flames and leather. “I’m being stimulated enough,” she said.

Loki sat down next to her and Thor cleared his throat. Valkyrie caught his eye, and he tilted his head ever so slightly. She took a swig of her drink and ignored him.

“Are you ever going to stop drinking?” Loki asked. His tone was academic, dispassionate, as though this were just an inquiry to pass the time.

“That’s none of your business,” Valkyrie said.

“It wasn’t your fault, you know. Your sisters dying and you surviving.”

“Yeah, it was that bitch sister of yours, wasn’t it?”

“I was adopted,” Loki said. He tried to say it like a joke, but it fell flat. “I don’t know what it’s like to be the last of your kin—”

“Not for lack of trying though,” Valkyrie said. “Didn’t you try to destroy Jotunheim and kill all the Frost Giants.”

Loki grimaced. “I see my brother has caught you up.”

“Yes. And I hardly need him to tell me not to trust you. So whatever tricks you are up to, whatever reason you have to try to connect with me, they’re not going to work. So, piss off.”

Loki pushed his hand through his dark hair. They had been off planet for several weeks and he’d finally run out of whatever gods-awful concoction he slapped on it to make it greasy and lank. It hung more fully around his face now, unkempt but the better for it. “For the moment, Brunnhilde, I am out of tricks.”

Valkyrie glared at his untrustworthy face as she took another gulp. “Don’t call me that,” she said, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand.

Loki nodded in acquiescence. “It is a mouthful of a name, I’ll admit it. But fitting. ‘Armored battle maiden.’ Did your mother give you to the Valkyries the day you were born?”

“Yes,” Valkyrie said shortly.

“Hm.”

“HULK NO FISH! HULK HATE GO FISH!” Hulk brought his giant fist down on the table, ending the game amid outraged cries from Corg and the others.

“The sun is going down,” Thor intoned, and Valkyrie was surprised to discover she had also said it, so accustomed to that annoying phrase after every Hulk outburst she didn’t even have to think about saying it.

Thor grinned at her, looked at her for just that nanosecond too long. She lurched to her feet unsteadily.  
“The sun _is_ going down, Your Majesty. Somewhere. So, I’m going to sleep.” She saluted him with her half-empty bottle and stumbled off among the Asgardians on the main deck.

Loki was somehow waiting for her at her door when she arrived there. “You know, you can’t hide from my brother forever at the bottom of a bottle,” he said.

“I have hidden from far larger and more terrible things than Thor.”

“Yes, well the least you could do is tell him why, so he can stop moping around the ship. Can’t have a moping king. Bad for morale.”

Valkyrie leaned against the wall. “What do you care about morale?”

“Are you kidding? If these people get cranky, who do you think they’ll turn on? Thor? With his golden hair and long flowing cape. Hulk? Who could smash them? Or me. The weasel-y brother no one wanted to bring along in the first place. Best to distract them with your epic love story. Even if it's a lie.” He held up his hands in a ‘what-do-ya-say?’ gesture.

Valkyrie took a deep breath, straining for some focus. “I don’t know what you’re up to, Trickster, but even this far into my cups, I know I should do the exact opposite of what you say.”

Loki flicked his eyes up in annoyance. “Does no one think I actually want my brother to be happy? That I actually just want to play Go Fish and be one of the gang?”

Valkyrie smirked at the put-upon expression on Loki’s face. He really did an excellent job with the ‘I’ve turned over a new leaf’ pose, a perfect play of guilt and regret and hopefulness that he could be better. Valkyrie could see why Thor had been fooled by him so often in the past. She pursed her lips. “No one thinks any of that, Loki Laufeyson.”

Loki flinched like she’d hit him. She might even have felt bad if she’d had less to drink or Thor hadn’t told quite so many stories of Loki’s mischief and mayhem. She staggered into her room and closed the door on the trickster. She slid to the floor against the wall and let the swirling heaviness of the alcohol mute her thoughts.

It didn’t matter that Thor was moping. He’d find someone else. With his looks and pedigree, he’d be fine. She had to wonder, in fact, if he wasn’t a little bit of a masochist -- never giving up on his brother and then trying to pull her – a known entity of bad, terrible actions – into his orbit. She was doing the man a favor, whether he saw it or not.

He was letting his hero worship of the Valkyries get in the way of seeing her as she was – a corrupted warrior fallen from grace. What could he know of that? He, who always made the right call and thought of others and never lost hope.

Though he was the god of thunder, he was pure sunshine. And she was a dark, brooding cloud of regret.

And as long as she was on this ship with him, she couldn’t forget – couldn’t push down her shame into some dark, dusty hall of memory. His goodness shone a light on all the recesses of her mind, made her see what she longed to turn away from. It wasn’t as invasive as Loki’s little trick back on Sakaar – she still owed him a blade between the ribs for that bit of magic – but it was just as effective.

As long as she was on this ship with him.

She knew what she had to do. It was just a matter of doing it.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I lied. There are going to be three chapters.

Valkyrie headed into the loading bay, fingers crossed that this ship had a pod made for more than orgies and birthday parties. Preferably something with a gun and a shower cell. Most ships of this size had a few lifeboats, but they weren’t always designed for long-term flight. Valkyrie had to assume she’d be on her pod for at least twelve months. Which meant she would definitely run out of alcohol. Not looking forward to that. Last time she’d found herself short, she’d decided to become a scrapper for the Grandmaster to get the cash to buy more liquor. She hadn’t intended to make a full-time gig of it, but it’d turned out she was good, and the alcohol made living bearable.

That didn’t make it right; barely made her feel better. _We do what we must to survive_ could absolve someone of a lot of sins. Sins that shouldn’t be absolved.

Valkyrie opened the bay on her first guess of the sequence code – it was red-green-red-green. A childish Sakaarian sex joke that she knew Grandmaster would not have been able to resist. The bay doors opened, and Valkyrie held her breath, hoping with all the strength in her Asgardian body that one of the life rafts on this thing would suit her purposes.

Hope rewarded. A pod unit – an M749091 if she wasn’t mistaken – was parked in the far corner as if waiting for her. The M749091 wasn’t a life raft, but a research pod. Grandmaster’s minions had used it to get near  space ships that got too close to Sakaar’s doorways. They’d even managed to bring in some contenders from their research raids when they were able to surprise the ships out there – poor fools probably just wondering what all the giant portals were about. The pod had stealth mode, cannons, and a shower, all Valkyrie required to get offboard and on with her life.

She strode across the bay toward her new ship. It was bulbous and round, like a fat bumblebee, its color scheme as a gaudy as everything else Grandmaster owned – candy-bright shades of orange and blue and pink. She’d have to think of a name, scrape off the letters on the side. The current tag was _Fun and Games,_ which didn’t really match with Valkyrie’s aims. To go find redemption.

She climbed into the pod and had a look around. She could fly it on her own, which was a plus. Usually something this size wanted two pilots. It smelled of strong cleaners, which either meant the last crew had been very tidy or they had hauled in something unspeakably dirty and needed to get rid of the residue. Maybe that slug fellow Hulk had torn apart a few months ago. Slug had been an off-planet acquisition. Someone had gotten two million blinks for him, Valkyrie had heard.

She sat in the pilot’s chair and brought the ship on line. The chair was squashy, comfortable; the grip on the controls fit in her palm well. She could do this. Leave her people. Again. Leave Thor and Hulk. She bit her lip. She’d miss Hulk. They’d been friends for two years. She should have told Thor that when he asked. Hulk had been her friend on Sakaar. And if that quinjet’s fate was anything to go by, Hulk didn’t take kindly to friends leaving him.

Valkyrie rubbed at her tattoo. She supposed this was going to be a “sneak away in the dead of night” situation. Only they were in space, so technically there was no night. Everyone’s rhythms had been thrown off the last few weeks until Thor thought to set the lights onboard to dim and brighten to mimic the hours of Asgard. (“Wise and clever,” Valkyrie had complimented him, and his pleased smile had made her stomach flutter.) She would wait for the lights to go down and everyone to fall asleep. Then she’d take her leave. She wondered how much liquor she could fit in her ship and more specifically, if there was any more of the ruby drink. She had accustomed herself to the fire and leather taste and found she preferred it to the wart stripper she and Thor had polished off. She was in no position to be choosy, but still.

Valkyrie went into the small kitchen at the back of the pod and rummaged around the taps. As expected one of them poured out water and another poured out a thick, taupe sludge called Nutri-En (a Sakaarian synthetic liquid crammed with all the vitamins and nutrients the body required; serving size: 1 swallow). The last tap poured out a glowing blue liquid that smelled like ozone. Valkyrie leaned over the tap and tasted it.

“Far,” she sighed appreciatively. What was a pod without a vast quantity of Liquex, the ingenuous liquor made from the runoff of certain kinds of ship engines -- M749091 engines, for example. She’d have alcohol as long as the ship was running. And the ship was itself in excellent condition. She couldn’t have asked for more.

"Running away, are you?" Loki asked.

Valkyrie stumbled away from the sink in surprise. She wiped the Liquex from her chin and scowled. "How do you creep so silently?" she demanded, loathe to admit he had startled her but annoyed enough to want an explanation

Loki touched a finger to the wall and his hand passed through it.

"Magic," Valkyrie sneered.

"I couldn't risk you trying to work out your issues on my face again," Loki said with an amused shrug.

Valkyrie cracked her knuckles and turned off the Liquex tap. "I wasn't working out my issues," she corrected. "I just don't like you."

Loki smiled. "A prevailing sentiment, I'm afraid."

"What do you want?" Valkyrie asked. She didn’t have the patience to run through another self-pitying conversation with Loki.

"Thor and Hulk were looking for you."

Valkyrie narrowed her eyes. "Why?"

"They are under the mistaken impression that you are their friend, and they’re worried about you. What with the excessive drinking and hiding in your room all hours of the day and night."

Valkyrie glared at Loki, but he only stared back at her, his blue eyes piercing and unblinking. She looked away first.

“I don’t have any interest in going to Midgard,” she said.

“Why not?” Loki asked. “They think of us as gods.”

“I have no interest in being a god.”

Loki sighed. “The allure has somewhat faded for me as well. At least, on Earth. Humans are an irritating bunch.”

“And they kicked your ass and sent you packing last time you came to visit,” Valkyrie pointed out.

Loki frowned. “That, too.” He flexed his hands. “Which is why I come to you with a proposition.”

“The last time you made a proposal, you tried to sell your brother to Grandmaster.”

Loki smiled unabashedly. “I haven’t decided if I’m more annoyed it didn’t work or proud that Thor has finally learned to be wary.”

 “You _should_ be ashamed of yourself,” Valkyrie said.

“Shame, guilt, remorse. These are the emotions of mortals. Could you imagine living our long lives always looking back at what we’d done, the mistakes we made?”

“Can you imagine living our long lives never learning to be better? To be good?”

Loki smiled sadly. “It’s not in my nature.”

“Boar shit,” Valkyrie said. “The way you would see it you’re the son of a Frost giant whose adopted daddy didn’t give him enough attention, so now you’re not responsible for your actions. You can’t _help_ but sell your brother out every chance you get. You can’t _help_ picking the side of mischief and chaos even when it means destroying the one person alive who still gives a shit about you. Get over yourself, Loki. Your past is not a shackle, yoking you to a life of disorder and wickedness. It is your present choices that count!”

Valkyrie wanted to punctuate her words with a slap to Loki’s face, but he’d wisely chosen to remain somewhere else. She glowered at his hologram instead, which was pale with anger or shock. “Now, get off my ship,” she ordered and turned her attention back to the Liquex tap. “I don’t want to hear your propositions.” She ducked her head under the faucet and turned the stream on. The bittersweet, medicinal taste on her tongue was a welcome promise of intoxication.

***

“Valkyrie!” Thor boomed across the deck. “We thought you’d stowed yourself away until Midgard!”

Valkyrie smiled at Thor’s beaming, eager face. “Just catching up on my beauty sleep,” she said. “Sakaar is not the most restful place to spend a few centuries.”

“You look none the worse for it,” Thor said. He grinned, and Valkyrie felt that tell-tale flutter in her stomach.

“What about you?” she said. She sat down beside Thor on the bench. “You lost an eye and aren’t a jot less handsome.”

“I quite like the eyepatch,” Thor said. “I recently met a Midgardian – Fury, you’ll love him – very imposing fellow. The eyepatch gave him gravitas. Authority.”

“Fury?”

“He was sort of my boss at work. Cool guy. He helped us bring down Loki.”

“Hm,” Valkyrie said.

Thor took this for encouragement and launched into a spirited description of Fury – a man of flapping leather jackets and great one-liners. Valkyrie watched Thor speak animatedly with a twist of sadness coiling through her insides. He was so wholesome and good-spirited. There was nothing of meanness or artifice about him; no sense of cunning or ambition. Just a really good person with lovely muscles, a killer smile, and some pretty sexy tricks with lightning. Valkyrie had always assumed men like him were a myth.

“Are you alright?” Thor asked. He waved his hand in front of her face.

“Huh? Yeah.” Valkyrie smiled. “Do you think Hulk would play Go Fish with us now? Or is he still pouting?”

“We moved on to War, actually,” Thor said. “And you’d think since it’s a game of pure chance, I’d come out on top more often, but he’s beaten me every hand.”

“Maybe I’ll be your luck,” Valkyrie murmured.

Thor’s friendly gaze darkened into something richer and fuller and Valkyrie indulged herself for just a moment, leaned in close for just a moment. “Or maybe I’ll end up on top,” she whispered. Her eyes dropped down to Thor’s mouth and he was so close. Tt would be so easy to just pretend. Valkyrie wanted Thor to hold her in his thick, sinewy arms. She wanted to taste the salt of his skin and run through meadows on Midgard naked together. She wanted to fight alongside him as she had fought alongside Sigga, only this time they would fly together, and they would fall together. She wanted, she wanted, she wanted…

“Valkyrie,” Thor said.

She shook her head. “Or maybe Hulk will triumph over us both. What do you say, big guy?!” she yelled loud enough for Hulk to hear across the hangar. She turned her body away from Thor and swiped up the deck of cards. She didn’t want to see his face – his confusion with her. She couldn’t have her cake and eat it, too. She couldn’t keep her distance from Thor and have him, too. And she’d already decided she had to keep her distance.

Hulk lumbered over and sat down on the floor beside the game table. “Hulk declare war!” he shouted. “Hulk win!”

“Not this time, big guy,” Valkyrie said.

“Yes, this time, little girl.”

Valkyrie laughed. Gods, she would miss Hulk. She tossed her hair over her shoulder and accidentally caught Thor’s eye. His usual cheery smile had been replaced by a perplexed gloom that Valkyrie knew she was at the heart of. There was no denying their chemistry, the – forgive the pun – spark between them. She liked him, and he liked her, and it should have been simple. Damn, it should have been simple.

“What do you say, Your Majesty?” she asked, inflating her voice with a carefree gladness she didn’t feel. “Do you think we can take on the Hulk?”

Thor smiled a small smile. “We can try.”

***

When Valkyrie arrived at her bedroom door after Hulk continued his odds-defying win streak in War, Loki was once again leaning against the wall waiting for her. “This is the third time in two days you’ve wanted to talk to me,” she muttered. She upended her flask over her open mouth and scowled to find it empty.

“When you leave, I’d like to come with you,” Loki said.

“And I’d like a pegasus,” Valkyrie rejoined. She patted her hip to see if she had another flask on hand and when the search yielded nothing, scowled up at Loki.

She was surprised to see a look in his eyes of earnest desperation that was hard to fake. “Please,” was all he said. Quietly. Resignedly.

Valkyrie squinted at him. “Why?” she asked. She was being pulled in by his tricks, she knew, but damn if he wasn’t a talented actor. She didn’t even have the excuse Thor had of _wanting_ Loki to be genuine and reformed. Chalk it up to his undeniable talent: Loki dealt as expertly in lies as Thor did with thunder and lightning.

He grimaced. “You were right. I need to – ” He paused and his face paled. “I need to take responsibility for the things I’ve done. And Thor and Asgard shouldn’t have to deal with the consequences. I can’t go to Midgard. We both know it. Thor knows it too, though his love and optimism blind him. I want to get as far away from him as I can. _For_ him. For his people.”

Valkyrie squinted at him warily. “You are the god of lies, Loki. How can I know you’re sincere?”

“You can’t,” he admitted. “But think of it this way: you’ve already bested me in hand-to-hand combat and I have nothing to gain by living in close quarters with you. It is your ship and you can put me off at the first habitable planet we stumble upon. I give you my word, as worthless as it is.”

Valkyrie leaned against the wall and slid down to the floor. Loki’s word was worthless, it was true, but then again, what harm could he do her without doing himself harm too out there in the unfriendly frontier of space? And she’d be doing Thor an even bigger favor to take out the trash with her when she left. “What do you think I should name her?” Valkyrie asked. “My ship?”

“Is this a test, the answer of which will determine my fate?” Loki asked.

Valkyrie shook her head and sighed. “No, I’ve already made up my mind.”

Loki smiled. “You wouldn’t consider naming the ship after me, would you? Loki can be gender neutral, I think.”

Valkyrie snorted. “No one can deny your audacity, Loki. I’ll give you that.”

“Thank you,” Loki said. He folded down into a cross-legged position beside Valkyrie on the floor.

“I always liked the name Thyra,” Valkyrie said. “If I ever had a daughter.”

“How would that have worked?” Loki asked. “I thought you and that woman from your…”

“There are many ways to have a child,” Valkyrie said, amused at Loki’s confused expression. “And I didn’t know whether I’d end up with a woman, a man, or some other person entirely when I was dreaming up this hypothetical daughter.”

Loki was quiet for a beat. “So, you’re not running away from Thor because you only like women?”

“No,” Valkyrie said. She would have laughed if the situation were different. “I’m running away for the same reasons you are. I need to take responsibility for what I’ve done.” Valkyrie watched Loki as she spoke, wondering if he would betray some ulterior motive by a twitch of his mouth or a shadow in his eye. His expression was guileless though, only ruined by the natural wiliness of his features: the foxlike cheekbones and pointed chin were mischief made flesh.

“Then we are two of kind,” Loki said. “Riding out on the _Thyra_ to find absolution in the vast reaches of space.”

“A drunk and a liar.”

“A Valkyrie and a prince.”

Valkyrie snorted. “Well, aren’t you a glass-half-full kind of guy suddenly.”

Loki shrugged. “I thought I’d have to do a lot more groveling to convince you I was sincere. When will we go?”

Valkyrie turned her empty flask over in her hands. “When the lights go down,” she said, “I’ll go to the bay. You wait a while and come after. Just make sure Hulk is asleep. He’s out on the main deck, so you won’t have to get too close.” She smirked.

“You wouldn’t be so smug if he ever smashed you into the ground,” Loki said sorely. He stared off into the middle distance and shuddered. “I won’t be sad to put some distance between me and Banner. That I can say with certainty.”

“He’s not so bad,” Valkyrie said.

“Well, as we’ve already established, I am quite bad. Hence, the smashing.”

Valkyrie chuckled. “The Revengers had a good run,” she said.

“So they did.”

 


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I didn't edit this at all.

_“Don’t die,” Valkyrie said as the wind whipped her hair on the rainbow bridge.  Thor raised his head in surprised delight that she’d finally admitted however obliquely that she cared whether he made it through this suicidal fight. She flicked her eyes skyward. “You know what I mean.”_

Valkyrie glanced at the ceiling when the LED lights in her room dimmed from their bright blue-white glare to a soft, barely-there yellow glow. She threw her legs over her cot and gripped her refilled flask. It was the last of the ruby drink and she wanted its courage. People had accused Valkyrie of reckless bravery all her life, but this – to walk away from what she wanted because it was the right thing to do – that took a purposeful sort of bravery she had never had to exercise. It wasn’t just Thor she was walking away from here. It was home; it was Asgard.

Valkyrie pressed her feet to the floor, reluctance like a tight rubber band around her chest. Standing up was its own tiny heroics. And it was easier after that. To put one foot in front of the other, to stride across the small closet of her bunk, open the door, cross the threshold, and walk down the shadowy hallway to the bay. She pressed in the code and the huge metal doors swooshed silently in their tracks.

“Loki,” Valkyrie said. He was standing on the other side of the door, looking profoundly guilty and … Valkyrie was surprised to say, a little apologetic. “What have you done?” she demanded.

Thor stepped out from the blind side of the door. “Valkyrie,” he said. His voice was laced with sadness.

Loki bowed his head. “He needed to know,” he said. “It would have hurt him more for you to disappear without a word.”

Valkyrie’s lip curled. “You cared about not hurting him? You?”

The pads of Loki’s shoulders rose and fell, but he wouldn’t look her in the eye.

 Very well. Valkyrie straightened her back and tossed her hair from her shoulders. “I’m leaving, Your Majesty. Now you know.”

“Loki says you are going to find redemption,” Thor said. He probed her gently with his gaze, soft and uncertain. “Why must you look out there among the stars? Instead of here.” He paused. “With me. And Asgard.”

“I think I’ll leave you two –” Loki tried to edge by Valkyrie out the hangar door, but she grabbed him by the elbow and flipped him over on to his back. She pressed her foot into his sternum, not hard enough to do damage, but with enough promise that she might that Loki only looked up at her, stunned and out of breath.

“This is your fault,” she said to him. “So, you can stay and face the consequences.”

Thor smiled. “He always did like to weasel out of the fallout of his mischief.”

“Mischief?” Loki said with clear offense taken. “I just did the right thing, I’ll have you know. I told Thor the truth.”

“And I’m very proud of your efforts, brother.” Thor smiled patronizingly down at Loki, then rolled his eyes at Valkyrie as if to say, Can you believe this guy?

The corner of her mouth twitched with a smile. He made it so easy to smile. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. She had to put on that mask of indifference she had perfected over the centuries. “Your Majesty,” she said. “I have been on my own for three hundred years. And I have been happy.” (Enough.) “I don’t see any reason to change all that because I helped you take out your murderous bitch of a sister.” She pressed down on her foot on Loki’s sternum again. “Or because your lying weasel of a brother can’t keep his mouth shut.”

Thor tilted his head, perhaps acknowledging the truly terrible apples on his family tree. He rubbed the back of his neck. “Let me summarize what you’ve just said to me, Valkyrie. Because I think you may lack perspective. You would rather travel through space with Loki --” Here he nudged Loki with his foot and Loki made a very put-upon face of annoyance. “-- directionless, rudderless, on some vague quest for absolution than stay with m–” He swallowed. “Your people. You’d rather hang out with Loki than … your people.”

Valkyrie almost laughed at Thor’s transparency and from the floor, Loki muttered, “You have got to be kidding me.”

Valkyrie added some warning pressure to her foot on Loki’s chest and looked up at Thor. “They are your people,” she said to him. “Not mine. I belong to no one and no one belongs to me.” She shrugged nonchalantly. As though she didn’t mind her loneliness or disconnection.

Thor took a step toward her, brought his hand up as if to touch her shoulder, then questioned her with a slight tilt of his head.

She gave a small nod and he cupped not her shoulder – that was a touch between friends, battle buddies. No, his hand settled on the crook of her neck, his thumb right at the hollow of her throat. This was the touch of intimacy, of a trust Valkyrie had not had in anyone since Sigga, of familiarity.  The weight of feeling threatened to knock her down. Thor swept his thumb up along the column of her throat, back down, raising a shiver on her skin, though his hand was hot. Her pulse jumped erratically, and she had to close her eyes again, because she couldn’t be this close to him, have him touching her so innocently, and look him in the eye without losing all the threads of her argument, all her very sound reasoning. It would be like chaff in the wind, puffy white dandelion seeds under the assault of a hurricane.

“I will not insist that I am your king,” Thor said. He brought his other hand up to cradle her chin, to tilt her face up to his. She squeezed her eyes shut tighter, bit the fullness of her bottom lip. She would not look at him. She would not. “Nor will I insist that I am your captain on this ship,” he continued. His voice was low and firm, a faint rumble of thunder underneath. “But I must insist, Valkyrie,” he murmured; she could feel his breath along the bridge of her nose. “I must insist that I belong to you. I am your friend.” Valkyrie could hear the smile in his voice. “I am yours.”

Her eyes fluttered open and there he was with that soft, uncertain, dorky smile, his hands cradling her face like a fragile gem. Crinkles of laughter appeared around his eyes. “You know what I mean.”

Valkyrie parted her lips. They tingled with want that traveled along her nerve endings like static electricity. Thor leaned in and Valkyrie twined her fingers in his where they rested on the delicate stem of her neck. Their lips were mere inches apart and --

“Do I really need to be here for this?” Loki asked in a bored drawl.

Valkyrie and Thor pulled apart and Valkyrie only just resisted the urge to kick Loki in the side.

“I thought this is what you wanted,” Thor said, looking down at Loki at their feet. “ _You can’t let her get away, Thor,_ ” he said in a high-pitched falsetto that resembled a small lisping child more than Loki. “ _She’s your equal, Thor. She’s my exact opposite in every way, Thor. She admits to her wrongs and wants to be a better person and has no desire for glory or power. She is the best person we have ever met on our adventures and you would be a fool to let her go without a fight_. You said all of that mere minutes ago when you came running frantically to my door, looking as though Fenris were at your back.” Thor lifted his gaze from Loki to Valkyrie. “He hasn’t said that many nice things about anyone other than himself in his entire life. Isn’t that right, brother?”

Loki grumbled mutinously, and Valkyrie looked down at him. He recoiled from her gaze and the embarrassment etched into his every feature as she scrutinized him rang true enough that she had to accept that he’d said and maybe even meant those things.

“He’s right, too, Valkyrie” Thor said. “Which is another first for him.”

“Is insulting me your version of foreplay?” Loki asked indignantly. “Because I did a very nice thing getting you here to give your big romantic speech and somehow I am on the floor being thoroughly abused.”

“Consider it restitution,” Thor said.

Valkyrie ignored Loki. “I was leaving for your own good,” she said.

“You are my good,” Thor rejoined.

“I’m really, really not.”

Thor’s face turned serious – brow furrowed and mouth hardened into a flat line. “You are, Valkyrie. This is a royal fact that brooks no disagreement. You are an imperfect drunk who used to yoke people for Grandmaster’s gladiator games. I know this about you and I still want you on this ship. In my life.” He grinned. “And besides that, no one has never done anything so awful they deserve exile with Loki as their punishment.”

“I mean, really!” Loki protested from the floor.

Valkyrie looked down at him and smiled. “Your majesty, you may have a point.”

Loki huffed in annoyance. “This is the last time I do anything nice for you people.”

Thor took Valkyrie’s hands in his. “I can’t make you stay here. I wouldn’t want to, anyway. But give me a chance to convince you. One chance and then the choice is yours.”

“Convince me?” Valkyrie questioned. She couldn’t resist a smirk.

“Oh gods, you know what he means,” Loki said.

Valkyrie smiled. “I think I do.”

***

Thor kissed Valkyrie insistently, urgently, pressing her wrists above her head, bracketing them both in one of his large hands while his other ghosted up her side and cupped her breast. She sighed into his touch, surged into his kiss. Heat and need tickled her skin, and she was acutely aware of her palms, earlobes, nipples, kneecaps, shoulder blades, ankles, even the fuzzy down of hair at the small of her back.

Thor brought his lips to the shell of her ear, hot breath blooming across the lobe, fan to the flame while he continued to knead her sensitive breasts. When he pushed his thigh between her knees, she grinded down on him in a dance her bones had missed. Yes, her body sighed, that’s it.

She tugged against his hold on her hands and he let her wrists go only to grab her around her waist and hoist her up against the wall. That was fine. She only wanted her hands free to return the favor of touch. She sucked his bottom lip into her mouth as she ran her fingers over the fine, silky hairs at the nape of his neck. He groaned and she smiled. She could get used to him making a sound like that – somewhere between it’s too much and it’s so good.

Valkyrie had never been one for a lot of kissing. She always wanted to get her mouth on the other parts of her partner, but Thor made her reconsider her stance. The give and take of his lips on hers, his tongue darting out to tease hers, the tingling of nerves that threaded out from her lips to her groin to the balls of her feet digging into Thor’s back.

She liked that he could lift her so easily, that he had her balanced on his waist like it wasn’t even an exertion. She liked the thick, hard muscles of his arms around her. It was exactly as she had imagined – in the brief moments that she had allowed herself to imagine. He was hot and hard and unyielding around her. It was different from Sigga, who had been willowy and soft, even a little dreamy and out of it when they made love. Thor was solidly here, undeniably present.

She grabbed his face and held him still for her explorations of his prickly jaw, of the spiral of his ear. She sucked on the hot, salty skin of his neck, savored the vibrations from his throaty laugh.

“Valkyrie, you are killing me,” he said.

She liked that. She took it as highest praise.

Thor turned them away from the wall and walked her to his bed, but when he tried to set her down, she pulled him with her legs and he landed on top of her, only managing to catch himself on his elbows. She kissed his nose as he grinned at her from a mere inch away. She kissed him again.

“Am I convincing you?” he asked, pressing the length of his body on hers, knowing she could take the weight, knowing she would want to. She spread her thighs to give him room and rocked her hips upward for the friction.

“Convincing me of what, Your Majesty?”

He moved his hips in rhythm with hers and Valkyrie couldn’t help the saucy, immature thought that bubbled to the surface of her mind: “I’m dry-humping the king of Asgard.”

“Convincing you of the depth of my feelings for you?” He looked at her with naked, unguarded affection and she felt it like a physical sensation.

“I thought you were convincing me to stay,” she said.

Thor got the little crinkles around his eyes again and his smile was goofy and ridiculous. “I had a two-pronged plan of convincing,” he admitted.

“Yeah?” she panted, the restless roll of their hips pushing her right up to the edge of pleasure.

“Three-pronged, actually,” Thor said. He chuckled at a joke Valkyrie hadn’t fallowed.

There was a buzzing in her ears that maybe meant she had missed the punchline. She spread her thighs even further apart, wanting Thor’s hardness right against her, right where she needed him, and he obliged, pressing down into her, thrusting forward to meet her. The heat was coming in faster waves now, out from her core to her fingertips, out from her groin to her toes. She let her head fall back and her eyes shut. Her back arched, and Thor took up kissing her throat and collarbone and breasts again. She felt like the universe before the Big Bang, condensing tighter and tighter into a knot, a swirl of elements, the energy building to something, building building the heat and pressure too much and Valkyrie came apart at the seams, she came apart right where Thor was grinding down into her shaking and shuddering and gasping as her orgasm fragmented her thoughts into _yes_ and _good_ and _Thor_ and…

She exhaled loudly, a deep satisfaction unfurling inside her. Her limbs were heavy with contentment. When she opened her eyes, Thor was staring down at her with such unabashed admiration, she buried her face in his chest to avoid him.

He laughed. “That was the single most beautiful thing I’ve ever witnessed,” he said.

“It’s been a while,” Valkyrie said.

“Glad I could help.” Thor sounded immensely pleased with himself.

“Take your clothes off,” she said lazily. “Lord of Thunder.”

Thor bit her lip, just sharp enough to hurt a little and then rolled off her to undress. She brought her hand up to her mouth and pressed her fingertip into the small hurt. She watched Thor shrug out of his clothes like a lioness watches a gazelle drink at the watering hole. Her first orgasm had apparently only whetted her appetite.

She stood up and helped Thor to pull the armband from his bicep, the last scrap of fabric on his perfectly sculpted body. Without her shoes on, she came only to his shoulders. She stood on the balls of her feet to kiss him on the chin, before she set her sights lower. This was the part she had always loved – mapping out a lover’s body with her mouth. Noticing the way they responded to open mouthed kisses, darting licks, wide-tongue lapping. She had been gifted with full, soft lips and she loved to use them. But before she let the party get too far gone, she walked Thor back into the door – he went where she pushed unquestioningly (that was filed for later) – and she placed his hands on the door frame.

He raised his brow quizzically.

“Don’t move,” she ordered.

He nodded, but his smile told her he had every intention of disobeying her. Maybe it was the eye patch, but he looked particularly roguish at the moment.

Valkyrie scattered kisses across Thor’s chest, kissed his nipples, his abs, the broad strokes of his rib cage. She lapped at his navel and noticed how his fingers tightened on the door frame, the little noise he made at the back of his throat when she nuzzled down his happy trail before veering off to the prominent wings of his hipbones. His erection bobbed comically in front of him and she liked to let it glance off her chin, her cheek, her shoulder as she attended to the sensitive areas around it. Thor liked it less, said in a stern voice, “Valkyrie, you are killing me,” but this time, it sounded like he meant it.

Finally, she took mercy on him and kissed the head of his dick. He hissed out an expletive and she took the tip into the lush heat of her mouth. He groaned again, let his head hit the door with a thunk. Valkyrie sucked on the head of his dick gently, flicked her tongue slowly, palmed his balls as she dragged her tongue up the underside of his length. A tremor went through his thighs and she realized it was an effort for him to stay still, to not chase the warm bliss of her lips. When she finally took as much of his length into her mouth as she could, he bent the metal of the door frame. Valkyrie flicked her eyes up to him, but didn’t stop. She loved doing this. Loved to be the author and creator of someone’s pleasure, to give them exactly what they needed, and then to watch them come undone, all from her mouth. She bobbed her head, used her hands on what she couldn’t fit. She hadn’t done this in a long, long time, but she remembered.

Thor came with a full-body shiver, his spine curling forward and his fingers bending the metal of his door frame beyond all repair. Valkyrie stayed with him until he twisted away from her, whispering “Please.”

She wiped the corners of her mouth and stood up. Thor’s eyes were unfocused, glazed. The color was high on his cheeks, little crescents of pink. She motioned for him to lower his head and when he did, she applied fluttering kisses to his brow, then the perimeter of his eyepatch. “You are by far the most handsome lord of thunder I’ve ever bedded.”

“Is that right?” Thor asked amusedly.

“Without a doubt.”

“Technically, you haven’t bedded me, though.” He pushed his hands through his sweat-damp hair. “We weren’t in a bed.”

“I guess we’ll have to go again,” Valkyrie said.

Thor grinned. “I guess we will.”

***

Thor slid into Valkyrie and it was the sweetest keen of relief. She swallowed his groan and clenched around him. “Gods,” he whispered, raising his head to look at her with something like alarm in his eyes.

“Can you keep up?” she asked him.

He smiled. “I’ve made you come four times, Valkyrie. The scoreboard reads 4-2, right now. The question becomes: Can you keep up with me?”

She clenched around him again and his face went blank with pleasure. “You shouldn’t have said that, Your Majesty,” she teased. “When there’s a score, I always win.”

***

“What was that thing you were laughing about before?”

“Huh?” Thor played with a lock of Valkyrie’s hair.

“Something about three prongs?”

“Oh,” Thor laughed again. “My three-prongs of convincing.” He held up a finger as he counted. “One prong: to convince you to stay. Two prongs: to convince you that I care about you. Three prongs: to convince you that I am very good in bed.”

“Hm,” Valkyrie said.

“How’d I do?” Thor asked.

“I could use some more convincing.”

***

“I’m going to—”

“Yes, you are,” Valkyrie said, managing to sound smug even out of breath as she rode him.

“I have to—”

“Come for me,” she purred.

“Fuuhhhhh—” Thor gave himself up to his orgasm, shuddering under Valkyrie and little tendrils of lightning crept across his skin, a miniature version of his full-scale God of Thunder schtick.

Thor looked down at himself and caught the lightning in his palm, where it crept along his fingers and down his wrist in a slow dance.

“That’s new,” he murmured.

Valkyrie reached out and touched his hand. The spark was gentle enough; it was comparable to the sting of Thor biting her lip. She grinned. “I can work with that.”

***

Thor had taken the captain’s rooms as his own and there was a full in-suite bathroom complete with a spacious shower stall, cavernous bath tub, and double daily ration of water. He filled the bath with hot steaming water, added some salts and elixirs until the surface of the water glittered like a distant nebula, lavender and sparkling, and then he and Valkyrie climbed into the bath to soak.

The water had a silky texture to it, so much more lavish than anything Valkyrie had experienced on Sakaar. She cupped the water in her palms and watched it trickle down her wrists. The flecks of sparkle swirled in the water with every little disturbance.

“You’re beautiful,” Thor said.

“You’ve mentioned that before,” Valkyrie said. She flicked her fingers at him and sprinkled him with the lavender water.

“I wanted to talk to you about…well, the reason you wanted to leave.”

Valkyrie shifted, her playful mood punctured.

“You watched all your sisters and friends die because of my family’s squabbling,” Thor began. “Because my sister was literally the worst person in the world and my dad was apparently not so great either. So, if you don’t want to stay with me because my family has caused you pain, I understand. But if you’re operating under the impression that you’re not good enough for me, then you’re wrong. I couldn’t have done what you did all these centuries. Survived. Coped. I would have been broken. You are strong, Valkyrie. And you’re still one of my heroes.”

Valkyrie’s eyes watered and she looked down into the swirling depths of the tub.

“I also thought you’d like to know,” Thor continued, “you’ll be in good company with the Avengers. Especially Natasha. She spent some time using her talents for bad people and now she’s one of the good guys. She’s constantly talking about redemption and red in her ledger or maybe blood in the ledger—”

“What?” Valkyrie said.

“I just mean that none of the Avengers are perfect. Stark made his money manufacturing weapons that killed hundreds, maybe thousands, and he finds a way to sleep at night. Banner, well, he turns into that raging monster in a crowded spot and he kills a dozen civilians. Don’t get me started on the Maximoff children. First, they were Hydra; now they’re Avengers. And the Captain. Well, he’s never done anything wrong in his life, but he’s pretty self-righteous about it, which is so annoying. So, you’re already doing better than him. Clint never shows up to anything on time and he carries, like, four arrows so he’s always turning into a damsel in distress and, well Rhodey is best friends with Tony, so there’s probably something wrong with him and Sam, um, Sam –”

“Thor, I get it,” Valkyrie interrupted. “Your team is a bunch of terrible people who get to be heroes.”

“Exactl—well, no not exactly. I just mean they’ve all had their ‘sell people to Grandmaster’ moments.”

Valkyrie rested her head on Thor’s shoulder and sighed. “I don’t think I’ll ever stop feeling guilty,” she said. “That’s what kills me. And if I don’t stop feeling guilty, I’ll always feel like a hypocrite.”

Thor cupped her chin. “That’s the price you pay. The guilt says you’re still trying. It means you still know the difference between right and wrong and that you’ll be doing everything in your power to make the right calls from here on out. It means you’re a good person. And good people deserve second chances. You deserve a second chance.”

Valkyrie pushed her wet hair back from her face and looked at Thor through the purple steam rising off the water. He looked so sure, so sincere. She wanted to believe him, that after everything she’d done, she was allowed to be a good person again.

“Valkyrie,” Thor said, “you are not who you had to become to survive.” He kissed her softly at her brow and when her eyes fluttered shut, across her closed eyelids, from cheekbone to cheekbone, the tip of her nose, her cupid’s bow.

She turned her face up to capture his mouth in a kiss that said she was willing to believe in his worldview, in his optimism, in his notion that not every evil deed deserved a punishment; that some deserved kindness, a change of environment, humility and regret.

He was such a soft man, under the muscles and power. He was soft and kind, but no weaker for it.

Valkyrie splayed her hand across his chest, right over the powerful thudding of his heart.

“You’ve convinced me,” she said. His pulse quickened under her palm. “I’m here and I’m convinced.”

 

Epilogue:

“Puny god gone,” Hulk said when Thor and Valkyrie emerged from his bedroom. “Baby Arms and Little Girl disappear.”

“Sorry, big guy,” Valkyrie said. “How’ve you been?”

“Bored,” Hulk said. “War?”

Valkyrie glanced at Thor’s frowning face. “One sec, Hulk.”

Valkyrie followed Thor to Loki’s room and found the bunk empty, divested of any sign Loki had been there. They went to the bay next and as Valkyrie suspected, her M749091 was gone. As soon as they stepped over the threshold of the bay doors, a large screen in the far corner lit up with Loki’s face.

He smiled down at them from the cockpit of Valkyrie’s ship.

_Hello, Thor. Valkyrie. If you’re seeing this, you have finally come out of your sex fugue and I am gone. As I record this, I am already nine hundred clicks away and you two have been in Thor’s rooms for three days. How you are not exhausted with one another at this point, I cannot fathom, unless you have murdered each other, and your poor subjects will find your bodies upon arrival in Midgard. Of course, I do not wish this to be the outcome. I truly want you to have a happily ever after, brother. Hence, I take my leave. As you said, we are on two separate paths and as Valkyrie said, I have to take responsibility for my actions and choose who I am going to be._

_I will not ask your forgiveness, Thor. I have asked too many times, you have given it too many times, and I have never been deserving. I will make amends to you, someday. I promise. And Valkyrie? Sorry about before. When I… [He raised his hand to echo the gesture he had used to make Valkyrie relive Sigga’s death.] That was invasive and wrong. And since you called dibs on the ship, I must apologize for stealing her. She is a beautiful spacecraft, the Thyra. I hope she will take me where I’m meant to be._

_Goodbye, Thor. Goodbye, Valkyrie. Be good to each other. I don’t have to tell you to be good. You always have been. Brother._

The video message twinkled out, the afterimage of Loki’s face fading slowly from the screen. He had looked sad and brave to Valkyrie, maybe a little scared. Space was a giant place and redemption would be hard to find.

Valkyrie looked at Thor. His eye glittered with tears, but he smiled. “I half want to turn this ship around and give chase,” he said, his voice coming out thicker than usual.

“We Asgardians live long, long lives, Thor. There is every chance you’ll see him again.”

Thor nodded. “I wonder who he’ll be then. I wonder who I will be.”

“Good men,” Valkyrie said. Well, Thor would be a good man. It was blind optimism to say the same of Loki, but Valkyrie was beginning to see the merit, the joy, of blind optimism.

“And what about you, my Valkyrie?” Thor asked. “Who will you be in the end?”

“I hear the Midgardians down there worship us as gods. Maybe I’ll be the goddess of something. Revenge, Retribution, and Redemption.”

“You’ve acquired Loki’s thirst for worshippers?” Thor asked, mock-scandalized.

Valkyrie pushed Thor’s shoulder and laughed. “Oh, shut up,” she said. “You know what I mean.”

Hulk banged on the bay door, startling both Thor and Valkyrie. “Everybody leave?!” he shouted angrily.

“The sun is going down,” Thor and Valkyrie said in unison.

“And no one’s leaving you, big guy,” Valkyrie promised.

“Except the puny god,” Thor pointed out.

“Yeah, but Hulk didn’t like him anyway. Right, Hulk?”

“Yeah,” Hulk agreed. “Puny God cheats at War. Hulk win! Not Puny God!”

Thor and Valkyrie shared an amused look, before each taking one of Hulk’s hands. “The sun is going down,” they sang together and walked back to the main deck on either side of the Hulk, Midgard-bound and full of hope.  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ***The 'you are not who you had to become to survive' line is a garbled, paraphrased version of a line that someone on Tumblr used for a Imperator Furiosa gif set that I loved. If anyone knows the set I'm talking about, let me know. I'd love to give that person credit. 
> 
> *** I like to think Loki goes back to Sakaar, sucks up to Grandmaster not to murder him, and gets in on all the chaos and misadventure. Just has himself a good time.

**Author's Note:**

> Thor Ragnarok was so good, y'all!


End file.
